Women’s rights group Women, Action, & The Media (WAM), one of the organizations that blew the whistle on Facebook’s failure to crack down on misogynistic content this past May, has now set its sites on Clear Channel.

Recently, the South Wind Women’s Center in Wichita, KS, which provides access to full-spectrum reproductive healthcare — including abortion care — tried to run ads for their services on several local radio stations owned by media conglomerate Clear Channel. Clear Channel, however, pulled them off the air for violating “decency standards.” But those same stations, WAM points out, run ads for the local “adult boutique,” without similar concerns about decency.

In response to Clear Channel’s decision, WAM, in partnership with the South Wind Women’s Center, launched the #changethechannel campaign in order to insist that women’s health care is never indecent, and that everyone has the right to know where they can get medical care.

Since the launch of the effort, thousands of citizens in Wichita and across the country have phoned, emailed and tweeted the Wichita Clear Channel office as well as Clear Channel’s corporate representatives, calling on the company to run the ads. Many thousands more have signed petitions to the same effect.

Amidst the uproar, the GM of Clear Channel in Wichita, Rob Burton, left his post on July 31 without public explanation. Burton had been responsible for the final call to pull the ads. A few days before his sudden departure, he had said simply, “As members of the Wichita community, KZSN has a responsibility to use our best judgment to ensure that advertising topics and content are as non-divisive as possible for our local audience.” Read more

The New York Times: Tina Brown Reflects on The Daily Beast and Newsweek Failed Merger

PR Daily: How PR Experts Can Avoid PR Burnout

The Washington Post: Why Traditional Journalism Isn’t Dead…Yet

Los Angeles Times: TSA Misconduct on the Rise, So What’s Going On?

Chicago Tribune: Blue Moon Tells Beer Snobs to Show Some Respect

Advertising Age: U.S. Adults Now Spend More Time Watching Digital Devices than TV

The New York Times: Irritable Tennis Legend John McEnroe to Represent Dove Men+Care

The Washington Post: Auto Dealers Reaping Big Profits from Resurgence of Industry

PR Daily: PR Advice on How NOT to Write a Blog Post

CNNMoney: The American Public Just Can’t Get Enough Chicken Wings

We’re not prone to bragging about our accomplishments (cough cough), but today brings official word that MWW Group has hired Jason Chupick, the founding editor of this very website, as vice president of editorial operations.

Jason previously worked as VP of PR at Harper’s Magazine. His experience spans the worlds of journalism, public relations and digital media: In addition to time spent in the publishing industry, he worked at several boutique agencies in the New York City area, and he frequently speaks at industry events and conferences like last month’s Mediabistro webcast on increasing the visibility of your press releases.

MWW plans to use his “ability to combine editorial content technology and editorial expertise” to implement media production and placement strategies for clients.

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Yesterday we shared some of the many third-party predictions and analyses of the Publicis/Omnicom merger and what it will mean to the future of the advertising and marketing industries. To recap: On the financial front, industry revenue totals will probably stay steady—but the organization of the game will undoubtedly change.

The next question: what role will PR firms and professionals play in this new arrangement?

Richard Edelman believes that PR will act as “part of the supporting cast” in this ongoing soap opera in order to back up the newest and biggest players, Digital and Data. In other words (via The New York Times), it’s all about the mega-agencies chasing Google to reach more targeted users via Big Data number crunching.

Yet, despite this hyper-focus on math nerds, Edelman writes that individual “thought leader” voices within the PR industry will grow even more valuable as they bring crucial “small data” research and insights to the table that no Google analytics study can provide. Jack Marshall of Digiday even argues that the role of Big Data has been overstated because the numbers ultimately belong to clients, not agencies (and that the whole thing is really an accounting issue).

Back to our main query: how dramatic will the change be for PR?

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PR Daily: Betty Crocker Donates Cakes to Same-Sex Weddings

New York Times: Fast Food Workers Go on Strike to Promote Their Cause

CNN: TSA in PR Trouble over Misconduct Allegations

Los Angeles Times: MLB and A-Rod Brace for PR Collision

Chicago Tribune: Is the American Public Losing Its Taste for Light Beer?

Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a bill into law that bans ”propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations” and threatens openly gay or “pro-gay” citizens and foreigners with fines, arrests and possible jail time. Another new law restricts adoptions of Russian children by people in countries that allow same-sex marriage.

With the 2014 Winter Olympics set to take place in Sochi, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) says it has received assurances ”from the highest level of government in Russia that the legislation will not affect those attending or taking part in the Games.” It pledged to ensure there would be no discrimination against athletes, officials, spectators or the media during the games.

Many equal-rights activists are unimpressed with the IOC’s response, and feel that whether or not the laws directly affect the games is far from the point. ”They should be advocating for the safety of all LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) people in Russia, not simply those visiting for the Olympics,” said Human Rights Campaign President Chad Griffin. ”Rescinding this heinous law must be our collective goal.”

In order to make their voices heard, activists have been writing petitions and staging boycotts.

The “Dump Russian Vodka” campaign, started by internationally syndicated sex columnist Dan Savage, has prompted bars across the US, UK, Canada and Australia to stop serving Russian brands like Stolichnaya. In response, Stolichnaya’s CEO Val Mendeleev wrote an open letter last week condemning the recent laws and reaffirming the brand’s commitment to the LGBT community. The brand’s website has also undergone an overhaul, and now features a rainbow block of text boasting that the brand “stands strong and proud with the global LGBT community against the attitude and actions of the Russian government.” (We’d call this a winning damage control response) Read more

The chattering classes were all abuzz yesterday about a sponsored post on everyone’s favorite site to visit for kitty pic listicles and condescending literary rants. (Wait, what?)

Here’s the story: In an amusingly blatant attempt to push its talking points to those young folks who will determine the future of politics in this country, conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation illustrated its distaste for the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, with BuzzFeed‘s trademark combination of one-liners and GIFs.

OMG CUTE LOL! But will it work?

We say meh. :-/

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We’ve all heard enough about this weekend’s Publicis/Omnicom merger to know that it’s too big for our limited minds to even fathom, much less evaluate.

So many questions followed: will it lead to mass layoffs or protracted battles over antitrust laws? Will it doom boutique agencies that don’t get picked up by major “holding company” conglomerates? Will it change our jobs in profound and permanent ways?

These are all valid, fascinating issues that must be considered—and for now we’ll let other people do the thinking for us, starting with those smartasses at The Onion.

Surprisingly accurate! That headline stings a bit, though we finally understand why they didn’t hire us for the grad school internship we wanted so badly (should’ve learned to code in high school, dammit). On a more serious note, Richard Edelman is skeptical of this supposed sea change, writing:

Bigger does not mean better. My 84-year-old mother’s first reaction yesterday was that this reminds her of AOL’s* merger with Time Warner. “They were all screwed up for years,” she said.

In other words, don’t freak out…at least not yet. But there will be blood.

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The Washington Post: Apple’s Next iPhone May Offer Fingerprint Recognition

CNN: PR Controversy: NPR Host Tweets Mother’s Dying Moments

PR Daily: What the Publicis/Omnicom Merger May Mean to Public Relations

Los Angeles Times: Google Reveals New Site for Panoramic Photo Sharing

Chicago Tribune: Southwest Airlines Fined $200,000 over Fare Advertising Violations